Don't make me frog it. You won't like me when I frog it.

A hump day victory, plus revealing the Granny Stripe Beast!

Something rather wonderful and unexpected happened last week. Out of the blue the number of hits to my blog just exploded! I occasionally get a bit of a boost if someone links to one of my patterns, or if a picture gets re-pinned on Pinterest, but this was just bonkers! Every time I hit refresh the numbers just climbed higher!

When I checked where the referrals were coming from I found that the latest project I’d added to the Hookin’ on Hump Day link party (jointly hosted by Moogly and Petals to Picots) had been the third most clicked that week, and so had been featured at the top of the post for the next link party! It was being featured that caused my hits to rocket rather than the initial round of clicking (does that even make sense?), and the project in question was the crochet bag I made my mum for Mothers’ Day using Lucy of Attic24’s Jolly Chunky Bag pattern.I left a message on Lucy’s blog to say thank you for her lovely pattern and to let her know that my version had done so well on HOHD but I don’t know if she has seen it.

I’ve tried quite a few of the wonderful free crochet patterns available on Attic24, and as it happens I’ve just finished another one, the Granny Stripe Blanket. It was another WIP that I was very keen to get finished before I am completely overwhelmed with preparing for the baby’s arrival in September.

Want to see some pictures?

Well, I course I’m going to show you, but I should warn you that there may have been some clumsy attempts to photoshop out a few things that maybe should have been hoovered or tidied away before I took the photos. Maybe. Hey, don’t judge. I was losing the light!

So here it is, my largest blanket to date: the Granny Stripe Beast!

The Beast is likely to take up residence on one of our sofas, but folded in half on the back, not sprawled across the entire thing like it owns the place!

Although there is something pleasing about seeing it all spread out!

I did five repeats of each of the 17 main colours, making a total of 85 stripes (not including the edging). I used the same 17 colours of Stylecraft Special DK as the original pattern called for (you can find a list of the colours and details of how to buy them as a pack here) but in a much more random fashion.For the edging I used Turquoise (which was part of the original colour selection) as well as Violet, Lime and Petrol (which were not).

Seeing it all neatly(ish) folded up, the Beast looks almost well behaved! And speaking of beasts not exactly on their best behaviour, Missy couldn’t resist a stroll across the middle of my picture…

The Granny Stripe Beast is huge, measuring about 166cm in width (haven’t measured the length successfully yet as I think it may stretch a bit under its own weight!) and I had to try and get one picture of it all laid out, messy living room and nosy cats or not!

The Granny Stripe Beast of a blanket on a totally not photoshopped living room carpet

Actually, I think Missy gave the Beast a better sense of scale. Still, photoshopping that carpet was almost as arduous as tidying up properly, so the picture says!

I am very close to finishing the new stripey border on my old knitted friend, the patchwork blanket that I started back in my mid-teens, and as it is my longest ever standing WIP I might even clear the living room carpet properly to take its mugshot when it’s finally finished. Maybe…

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Oh, WOW! That blanket is amazing! I can’t imagine the time and patience it took for you to complete that. Well done. It’s truly gorgeous, and I’m sure your whole family will love snuggling under it. And congrats on the blog traffic too!

There’s a lot to be said for a blanket that you can snuggle under whilst you are still making it. With a crochet one you can just enlarge the working stitch so nothing unravels, slip out the hook and snooze away! 🙂

I’ve made this too and it also is folded in half over the back of the sofa! It (along with all the others) gets used every night and adds a dash of cheery colour to the lounge. You needn’t have bothered with Photoshop though – all eyes are on the blanket:)